Good Days & Bad Days
by Keira-House M.D
Summary: Neverland isn't entirely cages and danger and bloodthirsty boys for Wendy. Sometimes, rarely, there are good days. But good days never last. Darling Pan implied.


**Disclaimer:** **I do not own the story of Peter Pan, which was written by J M Barrie. Nor do I own Once Upon A Time, which was created by Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz and is distributed by ABC. This story is the product of their characters and world and my imagination.**

* * *

Neverland isn't entirely cages and danger and bloodthirsty boys for Wendy. Sometimes, rarely, there are good days.

Of course no one should be mistaken. Neverland is a dark place despite its beauty. It isn't the island found in the fairy stories from the world without magic – reality rarely matches dreams after all.

Wendy knows the dark side of Neverland well. She, like many others, is seduced by the surface of beauty and adventure and freedom. It is only when Peter has her well and truly trapped there that he reveals the deepest, darkest aspects of her new home (prison).

And she is horrified.

Neverland is dangerous in the day (when the day comes, that is, which is when Peter Pan wills it) and even more treacherous at night. There are wild beasts and pirates and carnivorous mermaids and crazed Lost Boys.

There are deadly games and impossible tasks.

And Peter, of course, who is the worst of them all.

Neverland is like walking a tightrope without a harness. It is exhilarating and exciting but terrifying too, and you never know when you might slip and fall down and down and down.

* * *

There are good days, though. Few and far between but they do come around.

Good, golden days.

On these days Wendy isn't in her cage. She's free to roam the island with Peter, who shows her everything there is to see and smiles without malice at her genuine awe and excitement.

He holds her hand and leads her gently instead of roughly.

They play games that don't involve a chase that ends in pain, and there are shrieks of laughter rather than cries of pain.

All fun and no fear.

On the good days the sun shines to match Peter's euphoric mood.

The island is warm, the wild animals too hot and tired to attack, and everything is far less scary in the bright light.

They cool off in a pool and Peter teaches her to swim properly. The mermaids are as close to friendly as they ever get and no crocodiles nip at her feet.

These are the rare days when everything goes right.

The pirates don't want to ruin Pan's good mood, so they stay on their ship and don't threaten the camp.

None of the Lost Boys pull at her curls or cut her for fun or tease and chase her. No one disappears after making a mistake Peter won't forgive.

And Peter is like the boy she remembers from her first trip to Neverland, when everything was nice and happy and exhilerating.

Wendy loves the good days.

* * *

But the good days always end eventually.

Peter is set off by something – Wendy mentions home too fondly, one of the Lost Boys does something he doesn't like, or sometimes it is even just the sight of a pirate.

And then the sky clouds over and the fog rolls in and rain starts to pour and everyone rushes for shelter from the weather … and from Peter.

Wendy gets shoved back into her cage when the darkness falls and she goes meekly because any attempt to fight back leads to a scuffle that Peter always wins, and she always ends up with bruises and bite-marks on her body, and tear tracks down her face.

* * *

At first the good days are common, and they sometimes even get the good fortune to have four or five in a row.

But as her years on the island march on Wendy finds that the good days become rarer and Peter's temper gets worse.

It seems like her whole existence is just a succession of bad days and that the only glimmering hope at the end of the tunnel is the promise that a good day will come eventually (because she always likes to think it will. Even devilish Peter can't live his whole life without a little light).

* * *

Wendy endures the bad days, with all the horrors they bring.

There are storms that last weeks. Half of Hook's crew gets washed off the deck of the Jolly Roger and trees come crashing down and the lightning causes fires and the island is in near constant blackness. Wendy sits huddled in her cage with no shelter while the rain soaks her curls and her nightgown and she shivers in the cold.

There are days Peter chases her and pushes her into the freezing lagoon to flail and try not to be drowned by the mermaids or cut to pieces by the creatures that live there.

Sometimes Peter pulls her out of her cage for one of his sick, bloodthirsty games. The kind where she runs and runs but never escapes. Where no matter how hard she tries she always ends up caged in Peter's bruising grip or tossed into the water or pushed off a cliff to fall screaming until Peter catches her metres from the ground.

On certain days she'll stay locked in her cage while the Lost Boys poke at her and taunt her and hang her cage from a high tree so that they can drop her sharply to the ground.

Worst are the days when Peter won't stop touching her. When he leaves bruises and pinches and bites and tugs hard on her hair and wraps his bony arms around her thin waist and reminds her that she's his forever, _his_ Wendy-Bird.

And in the bad days she always ends up hurt.

But never is she in danger of death.

She's Peter's favourite toy after all (or that's what she thinks most of the time, when the good days don't delude her into believing he really does care for her) and he doesn't want her permanently broken.

However, that doesn't stop him threatening to break her wings if she tries to run off.

Sometimes, in the back of her mind, she thinks death might be a release. She never, ever voices that dangerous idea to Peter.

She lives solely for the good days.

* * *

There are many moments when she thinks she shouldn't be so accepting of Peter during the good days. Why should she instantly forgive him for the far more numerous bad days just because he's decided that he's in a good mood?

But she's been in Neverland a century with precious little happiness. She has to grab what she can despite the fact that Peter is an insane, mercurial boy king who is her captor, not her friend.

She judges herself for her choices but she will never let anyone else do so. Few have experienced the true cruelty of Peter Pan and those who have not have no right to look down on her for accepting the crumbs of goodwill when they are offered.

Constant war is tiring and Wendy is only a girl trying to find some peace.

* * *

Before Henry comes to Neverland there is an unprecedented week of good days.

She doesn't realise until a little later that it is Peter's celebration over the imminent arrival of the truest believer (and his heart).

She is only happy to be safe and having fun.

But then she is pushed back into her cage and told not to make a sound. And suddenly adults are all over the island and she's not seen an adult that wasn't a pirate in a hundred years and she has no idea what to make of it.

No one is bothering her in her cage, for once, but it still doesn't feel like she's safe because Peter knows, he _always_ knows and surely if she lets her guard down, if she thinks a good day might be coming again so soon, then he will swoop in to remind her that just because he's not there it doesn't mean she's free from danger or free from him.

And the days that follow are bad days because Peter makes her lie to poor, innocent Henry. And to Henry's family, who only want to save him. Then the group from Storybrooke tell her she's going to be free but she knows it's still a bad day, knows that they haven't seen a fraction of what Peter is capable of.

And she doesn't help them. Because while she is sympathetic and kind the years in Neverland have made her guarded and Peter has made her afraid and she thinks that maybe, just maybe, if she does as Peter says then she might get more good days.

She thinks she might be a terrible person. That's what a century with Peter does to a person.

* * *

For a brief time it almost seems like there will be a very, very good day. It almost looks like the adults will win and Wendy might actually be free to live a life of good days.

She hopes for a few minutes. Dreams of a golden life.

But Peter prevails. He always does. She doesn't know why she even bothered to doubt it.

On the blackest, darkest, and worst of the bad days Wendy has experienced, Henry Mills offers his heart to Peter Pan.

And no one is able to stop it.

They try, of course, but Peter Pan never fails.

Wendy cries for Henry and Henry's family and for the only real chance she's ever had to escape Neverland.

Peter is rejuvenated and more powerful than ever. He sends the adults back to Storybrooke with Henry's body and she knows she will never see them again.

* * *

And then the sun beams down brightly on Neverland. Peter is jubilant.

It's like a good day but it isn't one. She can't celebrate on this day.

She crawls into her cage and cries. Peter doesn't bother her, too pleased with his own success.

And she cries even harder because she knows that soon she'll embrace the good days that will follow thanks to Peter's victory, despite the fact that they have come at the cost of an innocent boy's life.

Because Neverland and Peter are her forever and the good days are all she has left any more.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it.**


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